


i can't find you in the dark

by clutzycricket



Series: Pathways and Maybes [9]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Azkaban, Crossover, F/M, Kidnapping, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Surprise Fandom - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-27
Updated: 2016-10-27
Packaged: 2018-08-27 07:56:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8393455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clutzycricket/pseuds/clutzycricket
Summary: There is some pattern to soulmates, to how people are matched. Or at least that is what they say. What happens when a pair is separated, and can't connect more than dreams or words on skin? (Don't ask a Targaryen that question. Ever.)





	

The writing started about a week before he went to Hogwarts, in a spiky, clumsy cursive. As he’d not had any writing since the bright, colorful splashes on his hands, the kind that had made his father scowl and Andy watch him with cautious, hooded eyes. They’d stopped suddenly four years ago, and he’d worried...

_ Hello. _

He looked up, listening for noises. Okay, whoever it was, they were a child, which was a problem. But since they were probably a muggleborn- the writing didn’t look like a quill had done it- he had time to plan before Bellatrix imploded.

It would help, he’d admit, much later, if he was a brilliant planner.

_ Hello _ , he wrote back, carefully. He’d be able to smudge it off, later, pretend he was writing notes to himself. That wasn’t quite acceptable, but he’d pull it off. He always did.

_ Who are you? _ they asked. The writing was purple, and they had loopy ‘y’s.

_ You started, you should say first, _ he wrote, quill digging in a bit too much.

_ Rhaenys _ , she wrote. 

_ Sirius _ , he said.  _ Where are you? _

_ San Fransisco _ , she wrote, the words coming after a long wait, slow and carefully written.

France, maybe? He’d have to figure it out.  _ I’m in London. _

_ With the bridge? _ she asked.  _ How old are you? I’m 8. _

Three years, he told himself, wasn’t that bad. There were plenty of wizarding marriages with worse.  _ Eleven. _

_ Cool. Nym’s 11, and she’s a know-it-all. _

~

“Mooooooony,” Sirius said, finally admitting he’d need to sneak into a muggle library for help, and asking Remus was faster. He’d already been trying for a year, with careful searches. Besides, James and Peter were the only other people in the room, and they wouldn’t tell his brother.

Remus sighed. “Yes?”

“Where’s San Francisco?” Rhae had fixed the spelling in her last note, and mentioned something about her pesky little brother and a bicycle and a hill. Her doodled version of events was obviously not true.

“California- the west coast of the United States,” Remus asked, not looking up. “My aunt went there once. Well, Mum’s cousin. Why?”

He waved an arm, sleeve slipping down to show violet ink spiraling down. “Rhae’s there.” He paused. “Bit far away.” They knew she existed, since her writing had spilled below his cuffs a few times, and he’d mentioned a bit more after James found out his match was Evans.

Peter laughed. “It takes three Portkeys, at least.”

“I think she’s a muggle,” he admitted, trying not to add his worries about his family, the complicated mess of wizarding laws, and everything else.

James’ head shot up, messier than normal from contemplating the fact that his match wouldn’t speak to him. “Why?”

“Bits,” Sirius admitted. “Here and there- but then I get confused.”

“Well,” Peter said after a moment, “Your cousin can never find out, I guess? Did anyone do their Charms homework?”

Sirius sat up. “Yeah, it’s done.” He scribbled a quick goodbye.

~

Rhaenys looked at the writing on her arm, then added something to her notebook. Arianne would tease her for being so careful, but Sarella was as curious as she was, and some of the things Sirius said were just... strange. Like, something out of one of Dad’s old books.

Balerion let out a yowl from the window, and Rhaenys let out a little growl of her own. Dad had finally... not settled down, exactly, but he’d gotten an apartment in... okay, upstate New York, which was possibly to annoy Mama, possibly because he liked the area and didn’t think of how it put out everyone else. He’d gotten the summers when she was eight and Aegon was six, and every August, Uncle Oberyn came and picked them up. (And picked a fight with Dad. Aunt Ellaria picking them up had been amazing last year, because Dad had been bulldozed and there wasn’t shouting.)

The cards Dad had given her as an early birthday present- or maybe late, her birthday wasn’t until Halloween, but Dad would be in... Manila, she thought- were wrapped in a summer scarf, and put in the lining of her suitcase. And her notebook would be hidden here, because Mom would freak about Dad giving her tarot cards, but she’d freak more about Sirius.

Probably. Rhae remembered that the feeling of her mother being that upset had kept anything but stray marks off her hands for four years.

(She hadn’t wanted to upset her mother. And by the time she remarried and was pregnant with Aliandra, it might not have been so bad? But… well. Aegon went to his first day of school the September before, and made friends with like everyone, all of her cousins had their own lives, and Rhaenys had been feeling left out, and then going to New York for a summer, even if Lyanna wasn’t there, had been terribly lonely. And then her mother said, “oh, by the way, you get a new sibling.” 

It was very easy to get lost with all the people. And Dad had the photos of little inked drawings on her arms before the divorce, and… well, it couldn’t hurt?)

She wrote  _ ‘cone of silence’  _ on her wrist, waiting for the faded, careless writing- she needed to tell Sirius to use a different ink, the sepia color he was using now was a pain to make out against her skin.

_ Silencio. _ He’d know not to write for twelve hours, which would get her home easily enough- Sirius had invoked it three years ago, before he told her he was staying with his friend James’ family. 

(She’d wondered if it had anything to do with his rambling, frankly alarming words about fucking up badly a few months before. But some things probably would take another two years, her eighteenth birthday, and the ability to leave the country without Mom worrying about Dad kidnapping her. Then she was sitting Sirius down and having a long talk. Which would help if she had more than a first name, age, and “Black hair and grey eyes”.  And that at one point he lived in London.)

He’d sounded worried, and was talking around something. It was irritating, and she wasn’t terribly long on patience. She blamed the fact that she was used to stupid avoiding shit meaning her relatives were doing something that would cause trouble. So much trouble.

“Hey, Mouse,” Arianne said, coming in her room in a sunny burst of color. “Got contraband?”

Rhaenys sighed, wondered if Arianne would tell... well, not Mom. Or Uncle Doran. Tyene, though, and Syl, and her other friends. “There is deck of tarot cards with dragon art. Do you think you can hide it in your purse?”

“Of course, little cousin,” Arianne said.

“I’m taller than you!” Rhaenys pointed out, fighting the urge to go on tip-toe.

“I’m still wiser,” Arianne chirrped, finding her hiding spot in five seconds. 

“You dated Gerold Dayne,” Rhaenys pointed out, dryly. She needed to wash the ink off her wrist before Uncle Oberyn and Dad tried to draw blood.

Uncle Oberyn would win, but Dad would call the police after a certain point. Just to be petty.

“One date. One really, really bad date, which I have learned from and refuse to repeat,” Arianne protested, sitting on the window nook. “And what’s wrong, Rhae? You have little stormclouds of unhappiness. Or, you know, sparks.”

Swallowing one of the curses Dad didn’t know she’d heard him use, she took a deep breath. Then out. The bronze-and-black sparks flickered out harmlessly. “Nothing.”

“You,” Arianne said, tucking the cards in her enormous purse, “are a terrible liar.”

“I am a fantastic liar, you just cheat,” Rhaenys snorted.

Arianne shrugged, crossing her legs. “Cheating would mean that you didn’t know what I could do.”

Rhaenys sighed. “Can I tell you when Uncle Oberyn isn’t lurking?”

“I’ll take you out for pizza when we get home,” Arianne smiled, opening Balerion’s cat carrier. “Now, since I am paying in blood, can I get his name? Or hers.” She tugged at her sleeves in a remarkably pointed gesture. Something in her eyebrows, maybe.

Rhaenys smiled. “Sirius. And I’ll clean it off now.”

Arianne sighed at the monstrous black cat staring at her, the ghost of shadows clinging to him. “C’mon, you food-stealing grimalkin.”

~

Something was wrong- it didn’t take a genius to know that, and Rhaenys Targaryen was a terribly clever young woman. Everyone said so, even if the tone hinted that this wasn’t a good thing.

Sirius had wished her a happy birthday two days ago, and said he was worried about a friend he hadn’t seen. He’d agreed to her idea about bringing his friends who were hiding from some sort of gang far from England, and swinging by so they could finally meet- she wondered about that, but concrete answers meant waiting for Sirius or possibly asking her father. And she’d vastly prefer waiting for Sirius.

By Thanksgiving, she had told herself. It would be a late birthday present, but she needed time to master her nerves.

But then she’d gotten ‘silencio’ written three times in broken, clotted letters, before they roughly vanished.

She had a timer, and she was going to write a damn novel all over when the timer ran out.

Being in school was a good thing- her roommate Merry was a lot more social then she tended to be, and therefore rarely in the dorm. She also had a match who was taking theater classes the next college over, and Rhae was set to win a bundle when they moved in together. There also was a lack of cousins poking in and meddling.

Though she might need meddling, if Sirius didn’t answer- she’d read enough about pairs, bond theory, and everything else to know that the connection grew deeper the more you put into it. Writing every day for eleven years wasn’t  **brilliant** , she knew, and most people couldn’t rely on that. They’d never met face to face. 

Most people weren’t her father’s daughter, with full access to his library and a set of notebooks that could provoke a lot of thought. 

Also witch hunts, which was why she was not studying the science of a match, in any form.

She could make the basic tincture when Merry was out, with the hotplate they used for hot chocolate and soup. (College tacky was cooking Lipton noodles in a hot water heater. College Targaryen Tacky was making a dream-magic tincture with Walmart spices and an oversized pink glittery mortar and pestle from a Halloween clearance sale. On her anthro textbook.)

Merry didn’t know she had a match, to be honest- most people thought she was pairless. Which… she wasn't. That was fairly rare- maybe five percent of the population? Usually either a romantic bond,  _ or _ a platonic bond happened, like the silver links between Mom and Uncle Oberyn. But she liked writing to Sirius, who was really, weirdly fascinated by the math class she was taking. (And she wanted to know how the hell he’d managed to avoid Physics like that.)

She held up the bowl and looked at it critically. It wasn’t a delicate mix, from the notes she had, the tiny glitters caught in it couldn’t hurt. It went in a clean water bottle for now, since she was trying to wait until, say, ten, before trying it.

She also pulled out the slightly fox-eared tarot cards, shuffling them restlessly. She’d finished her anthro paper, her math homework was done, she didn’t really have anything else worth doing tonight. (Which was the problem with going to college somewhere that wasn’t her uncles’ suggestion of Berkeley like Sarella. But Upenn was a great fit for The Plan, which Sarella had helped her with. The fact that she’d be spending her winters in Deep Freezeland sucked, but it all balanced out. She loved her family, but some space was nice.)

She could do this. She could do this…

~

The first sign that something was different was the feeling that it was warm. Azkaban,Sirius had quickly learned, was never warm. Not terribly warm, but anything was better than the bone-deep chill.

The second was that he had no idea where this dream was actually taking place. The trees were very… giant-like, in the way that dreams could be absurd, but there was something nice about the leaf-filtered light and mist, and the smooth, artificial paths and steps, and the bench where someone was sitting.

“My uncle took my brother and I here a lot, and then I went by myself sometimes, when I wanted to get away,” she said, curled up so her knees were touching her pointed chin. “I could take a bus.”

He blinked at her, wondering… “Rhaenys?” 

Azkaban had broken him quicker that he’d thought, he had to admit, if he was conjuring a shade of her. Maybe his idea about not being the Secret Keeper was a good idea, he’d just…

She gave an uncertain smile. “Hello, Sirius.” 

She was unfairly pretty, he thought, before going, wait, I’m imagining her, of course she is. 

“This isn’t real,” he said, to himself.

“It is,” Rhaenys said, bouncing up. “It took a little bit to find the recipe in one of Dad’s books, but it worked, so…” She shrugged. “I tried it, and it worked. You’ll find a little writing on your arm when you wake up, I’ll wash off before class.”

Sirius tried to debate what was happening. “I thought you were a muggle?”

She wrinkled her nose and muttered something he couldn’t understand. Some of the leaves started to fall.

“I thought you weren’t a witch?” he tried again.

“I can’t conjure spirits from the vasty deep,” she agreed, easily. “Or I wouldn’t try even if I could, so it is null. I have a parlor trick or two, but it is all Dad’s fault I can do this. Mom’s family has a load of talents, but I’m weird even for them.”

He didn’t know what to say about that, or at least he didn’t get a chance, before she gave him a slightly terrifying smile and said, low voice sweet, “Now, I need you to explain as much as possible to me.”

He did, and she stopped him when he needed to tell her about the Ministry, and how the Charm worked, and what dementors were.

She went grey-faced in the end, sitting against him on the bench, the scent of lavender and mint coming from her curls.

“You need to get out of there,” she said, firmly. “Now.”

“Good plan,” he said, trying to avoid bitterness and failing. “Might need some more details, though.”

“Surely someone will ask questions,” she said, before sighing. “...Never mind. I just realized the depths of blind optimism there.”

“It’s not your fault,” he told her, knowing it was his own idiocy that landed him in this mess.

“I still want to help,” she said. “If we can find Peter, then…”

“How are you going to bring him to the Ministry?” he asked. 

“I find your friend Remus, or someone else who might listen,” she answered.

“You’re mad,” he said, but something about her sheer bloody-minded stubbornness was infectious.

~

She wasn’t sure if telling her father would help.

Oh, he was thrilled she was using the library in his home, of course, in his own melancholy, reserved way.

(And, yes, she was perfectly aware that she could be described the same way, when she wasn’t with Ari and Tyene, or Leo and Myri, her much more satisfactory new roommates.)

She knew, though, that her father had done something truly stupid even before his handling of the Lyanna Incident, and that was why he had the library, and why…

Well, there was a lot of runoff from the stupid. And she didn’t know if it was worth it, getting him involved without knowing how he would react.

The sparks were useless- the little dancing lights sitting snugly under her skin, a constellation of what-if and potential. 

But it was closer to two years than one since her first dose of the dream tincture, and twice-weekly meetings had turned up nothing useful. The deadline for studying abroad was coming fast, and Leo had to pry her out of her books with dumplings or veggie mix more and more often, since it was basically her life was school, research, and running.

She had to get new sneakers soon, she’d worn the last pair out and there were holes in the rubber.

She’d written down a Dorothy Parker ditty on her arm before leaving- one of the ones that didn’t mention death and suicide, because she knew that wouldn’t be a good idea.

There was a man in one of those twisty little side streets near the other edge of the river, who dealt old books out of his apartment. From what she could tell, he had some type of connection to the wizards Sirius talked about.

She’d agreed to meet him for dinner, to discuss the books she might need. Sirius knew, but she maybe should tell someone else. Just for safety’s sake.

~

Six, seven, eight… Sirius turned on his cracked and painful heel and kept pacing, having woken from a drifting and broken sleep the night before. 

Nine days since the last dream, if he counted right, and seven since there had been anything written by her. 

Tomorrow, if his memory was right, the Minister would tour Azkaban so he could reassure the populace that all the dangerous Death Eaters and other problems were safely locked away. He’d need to get a self-inking quill, if possible, or… something. He could manage that. He’d write her, and it would work.

She’d be fine.

He snarled, remembering that he was stuck in here, and Rhaenys, who was clever and stubborn and… 

He didn’t really know enough. Well, he knew her, the way she wrote about her family, her roommates, classes, how she got when she was focused. But there was something important missing- they’d never used last names, and she’d ducked out of writing it once or twice. He’d wondered about that, but there was nothing he could do here.

The cold drew in more, and he wondered if he was starting to get used to it.

~

The man had been squirrelly, but nothing that couldn’t be explained by Sirius’ explanations of the Statute of Secrecy and her last name. Targaryen wasn’t terribly common, after all, and Dad, she was learning, had fucked up in a way so profound it was used as a teaching method.

And she couldn’t prove that Kayce was the one who did this, she told herself.

Amory Lorch was a creep par excellence, though. Beady little eyes, clammy hands, smacking his lips, all that. 

She’d probably have kicked his ass, if he hadn’t broken her leg. She probably couldn’t get out of this basement if he didn’t let her go. (He’d set it, roughly, it hurt like a bitch and she needed to go to the hospital, but she wasn’t dead. Yet. Did someone want her alive?)

She gingerly rolled up her sleeve, checking out the cut on her arm, broad and nasty, swollen and turning faintly green. Not good.

_ Rhae? _

Sirius’ writing, messier than it had been, and she let out a shuddering breath.  She wanted a pen, she wanted her potion, she wanted Sirius in the flesh, actually, with that useful-sounding wand and the ability to tell her if there were any bone-mending spells he knew.

But he was in his own version of hell, thousands of miles away, and she’d probably have that writing as her last clear memory, the knowledge that he was finally writing, and she couldn’t write back.

She wanted to finish her degree, she’d like to meet Sirius face to face, to get him somewhere that wasn’t Azkaban, for him to see his godson again.

Her eyes burned, and she rubbed them roughly with her good hand. Lorch brought her a bottle of water every so often, she’d use some to wash out her arm, and she’d plan.

There was dirt everywhere, and maybe…

She brushed together a pile of dirt, and poured a little water on it.

_ Need help.  _ The letters were faint and smudgy, but he could read it. Hopefully.

_ How? _

He didn’t even hesitate- maybe there was something changing, how he got a pen. Maybe Peter had gotten caught.

Too late, too late.

_ Kidnapped. His name Amory Lorch. Held in basement.  _ She sent that off in bursts, waiting a few minutes before wiping it clean.

She looked at the rickety staircase, reassured by the lack of light. That meant he wasn’t coming.

_ Use the sparks? _

She giggled and rubbed the dirt off with her sweater.  _ Leg broke.  _

_ You’ll get out, somehow. I can ask the _

He stopped, realizing they wouldn’t be able- or possibly willing- to help her.

_ I love you. _

_ Too. _

She bit back a grimace when her leg twitched, looking at the letters, all she could write with what she had left.

Maybe she could Spark Lorch somehow- the sparks were the wild magic aspect of Dad’s old rituals, mixed with Mom’s family all having the gene. She could pull them in her skin, what would happen if she shoved them  _ in _ Lorch? Surely someone would miss him- if she was right, he was reporting to someone, and they’d be interested in why Lorch didn’t show up.

The door creaked open, and she shivered involuntarily as she prepared to try to murder a man.

~

Sirius had nearly lost his mind, he admitted that, when the last little word Rhaenys had written faded away.

Peter was out there, still, he told himself. Sirius had not been the Secret Keeper. Harry was still out there, and Peter was out, and he needed to catch Peter before Harry was in more danger. The Minister had told him Harry was safe- it had been snide, it had been meant in a different way than Sirius chose to take it, but Harry was alive.

He had to cling to that, when the dementors came.

Rhaenys wasn’t there. Maybe. Or maybe she was, in pain and captured for Merlin knew what reason, and he was stuck here.

He laughed, bitter and the echoes seeming off. He’d been so close, just a week from getting James and Lily on a plane with Harry, of going to see Rhaenys before she hared off to see him and found herself in Bellatrix’s wandrange.

It had been… he wasn’t sure, everything sliding together in a grey mess, before he fell asleep and woke up in a tree.

“Please tell me I’m dead,” he said, sitting up and staring at Rhaenys. Muir Woods seemed like a good afterlife, though he’d expected an Evans Lecture when he kicked it.

But Rhaenys looked thinner than she should be, collarbones peeking out from the necklines of her jumper.

“You aren’t allowed to die,” she said, bruise-purple eyes intent as she got in his face. “Do you hear me?”

“Can’t control conditions in Azkaban,” he pointed out. “So I can’t make any promises.”

She grabbed him in a hug, the two of them curled together in the little cave in the giant tree, shuddering with sobs. “I wanted you so badly when Lorch had me, I was thinking that I could do this, I could, but not alone. And I could have, should have wanted Obara or Nym on my side, but all I was thinking was that I wanted  **you** .”

“If I could have been there, I would have,” Sirius said. “I want to be there.” All he wanted, that could happen? A little place for him to live with Rhaenys and Harry, and try and put his life back together.

“Things happened,” she said. “And I think I was offered something that might help, if I play it right.”

He looked at her, and she blinked her eyes a lot.

“Are you okay?”

“I tried…” she shook her head. “Oooh, boy, when we meet, there will be a lot of talking about communication and flirting.”

When. She still wanted to meet with him.

“Don’t put yourself in danger,” he said. 

She rolled her eyes, grinning up at him. “I’m not pulling a dad, don’t worry.”

“One day I will get that story out of you,” he grumbled, stretching his legs. The dream-cave expanded so he could actually be comfortable lying down.

“You have to actually meet me in person,” she said, tucking herself under his chin.

“Do you actually look like this in person?” he asked. She snorted.

“Shallow. But as far as I can tell,” she said, thoughtfully. “No cast here, thank god.”

“How bad was it?” he asked.

“I might limp,” she said. “But they aren’t sure.”

~

“Aw, Bonesy,” came a familiar voice. Rhaenys looked up, perfectly aware she was grinning.

Two years. Two painful, dream-filled years, pushing herself to her limit, lying to her family, and negotiating with Agent Hand over this. 

She’d managed to launch her sparks at Lorch, focusing on how it felt to pull them under her skin, the little fireflies of energy like lightning in her brain, dipping in and out of his skin into muscle and tissue, fighting her in a scattershot dance that made her move.

Which sent a jolt of pain down her leg, and her sparks broke free, burning holes through this shoulders, his gut, legs…

She tried to get up, tears streaming down her face. 

There was the sound of another set of footsteps, a shout, and the sound of something hitting the floor upstairs echoed like the voice of God, or at least the Angel Raziel.

“I did many things in search of knowledge, Rhaenys, but I swear I did them out of purity of purpose and with no malice in my heart…” her father had told her, once upon a time.

She was starting to **deeply** understand her mother’s view on her father.

She managed to pull herself closer to… well, she was trying to aim for the steps, but she needed to pull herself around Lorch’s smoldering corpse, the smell making her stomach roil.

“Search the creepy horror movie, Coulson says, take out the broker and figure out what Lorch was keeping for him, take out Lorch… okay, that bit is good,” came a male voice. 

“HELP!” Her voice was hoarse, and she was terrified he couldn’t hear her.

“Is someone there?” he said.

“Down here, help!” she called.

A sandy head poked through the cracked door.

“Is Lorch down here?” There wasn’t fear in voice, more a slightly manic sense of competency she’d gotten from Sirius’ more reflexive notes.

“Dead,” she answered.

The man adjusted his look. “He really is. Your work?”

“I didn’t think he was going to let me leave alive,” Rhaenys admitted.

“Need evac?” he asked.

“Does that include a hospital, please? Also talking to the college?” She’d finished her exams, and she hoped that she still had time before she started summer classes, but this was going to suck.

Her mother was going to murder her.

Hawkeye had taken her academic obsessions in stride, and gotten her to a nice doctor who’d bitched about how her leg was set, dealt with it, gave her the good drugs, and set her on a schedule.

Hawkeye had followed the bland man in the suit, who had confirmed that Rhaegar Targaryen was her father, asked about her powers, her schooling…

“And you aren’t registered as being part of a pair…” he said, after a moment.

Sirius’ last words she remembered were faded and barely legible now, and she shivered. There was a new set, asking how she was, to please do something…

“Can I have a pen or something?” she asked.

“Not until you answer a few questions, unfortunately,” the bland agent said, and she might have seen sympathy.

She took in a shaky breath, mind still slightly foggy from the pain meds, but Sirius was frightened, and in such a bad spot, what did they have to lose? 

“I’ll tell, but you have to listen.”

She’d explained about Sirius, and saw the agent and her rescuer look thoughtful, rather than dismissive.

“How’d he explain it all, though?” Clint asked, balancing a cup on his finger.

“I made a potion, it uses the bond to let me create a shared space in the Dreaming…” She hadn’t been sure if that had been the Australian Dreaming or something a bit more Gaiman, which was a flaw in her research, admittedly.

The cup fell, and he stared. “You can track someone through their bond?”

“Well, I could possibly do it with a map, but some ability for spellwork would be useful, but the dream connection would only work between a pair,” she hazarded. “Ask me when I’m not drugged.”

“Coulson,” he said.

“That is a useful drug,” Couslon said. “May I ask why you haven’t publicized it?”

“You don’t need magic to use it, as far as I can tell, but it does ease everything. You need some ability to make it, though,” she explained, waving her bandaged arm. “So it is limited to what I can make.”

“We’re keeping her,” Clint said, eagerly.

“She’ll ask for a price,” Coulson said, as if she wasn’t there.

“Sirius,” she said. “Sirius is my price.” She held up her head the best she could. 

“It would be fun,” Clint said.

“You can’t see dementors, Clint,” Coulson pointed out. “And if you try it, I’ll tell Agent Morse.” He looked faintly put-out by his threat, which was amusing.

“You’re no fun,” Clint sighed. “And Bobbi would hate me for going without her getting to prepare for a week. But she’ll sign up to test it with me, you know that. Also, Fury reaming out Gandalf is a mental image that will never not be funny.”

Which had started this all. Clint found her hilarious, for some reason, and kept bothering her as she worked like a madwoman to complete her degree. Three years, so many summer classes, and endless coffee.

It wasn’t that she disdained sleep. It was just that her own comfort had never been high on her list of priorities.

( _ Sometimes I just have to smile and take the comments and swallow my screams until I have to get away _ , she’d written when she was fifteen, and Sirius had told her about his parents and their expectations and reactions. While her family wasn’t like that, there were still the tiny pauses whenever she acted Too Targaryen, learning how to exhaust herself trying to match her family.

Sitting with Quent and just being quiet had been terribly relaxing, however much she loved her cousins.)

Clint and Bobbi were curious about her work, and Clint had gleefully taken to asking her about horror movies and what could really happen from that.

(Okay, some of it, done with one of the older researchers, had proven that feral vampires were in Vegas. Which was a ridiculous story she’d passed along to Sirius, drawing in the sand of some cliche beach to show the Alien-style jaws involved. 

She’d added  _ Aliens _ to Sirius’ movie list, the next morning.)

Stephen Strange was a bizarre man, who seemed slightly out of the currents of reality, and had eyes that looked like they turned to some galaxy pattern. He’d had a very restrained freak-out when he heard her last name, and Bobbi had given her shark-smile, reminding him that he was doing a good thing, that SHIELD needed his help, and to think about the headaches that might happen if such was problem was left unaddressed. 

“Yes,” he’d said, furrowing his eyebrows, dark eyes searching her face. “I can imagine the problem of leaving a Targaryen alone to deal with such a problem.”

But somehow he had fetched Peter, and he’d joined Fury to discuss the problem with the Ministry of Magic.

“Seriously, what’s the deal about Targaryens?” Clint asked. “Strange watches you like he expects you to suddenly turn into Darth Vader.”

“I’d like a lightsaber,” Rhaenys sighed. “It would be a nice equalizer.”

“Bonesy,” he said, twisting the nickname some of SHIELD had started to give her, “You aren’t allowed a lightsaber. You act all sweet and polite, then someone actually manages to piss you off, and are politely  _ scary _ . Hannibal levels of scary. We’re thinking about trying to bottle it.”

“I don’t drink wine,” she mused, looking at the clock again.

“Is your father a vampire?” Clint asked.

“Yes, Clint, my father is Dracula,” she said dryly. “Seriously, why didn’t you ever ask Coulson?”

“I tried, he said to ask you,” Clint shrugged, not bothered by her ducking. He was remarkably easy-going, and he trusted that she wasn’t going to actually go Darth Rhaenys on everyone.

Which made Strange acting like a cat in a room full of rocking chairs entertaining.

“I’ll tell you when you get back,” she promised. “I owe Sirius the story first.”

“Hoes before bros?” he teased.

“You and my brother do share a certain tendency towards absurdity and inability to realize when you shouldn’t use sarcasm,” she agreed, standing up. 

“No getting near the twitchy wizards,” Clint said. “He does realize you are a pin-up encyclopedia, right?”

She snorted. “I’ve been called worse, Clint.”

“That wasn’t meant as an insult, I’m just really curious about how all this will fall out,” Clint said. “You two were seriously close but never met. Plus I’m not sure if anyone who isn’t involved in the project even knows you have a match. Seriously, go bother Bobbi or Izzy if you need to, okay? Bobbi will be happy to involve you in some plan that will possibly call up the End of Days.” That sounded bizarrely fond, if you weren’t used to Bobbi and Clint.

“I will,” Rhaenys promised. “Probably before I invite my mom and stepdad to meet Sirius.” After Arianne and Tyene, possibly. “I’ll probably be so busy trying to explain the mess that I can avoid them. How long will you be gone, again?”

Clint grinned. “No idea- I’m tracking a ghost.” At her tilted head and faintly worried expression, he added, “Spy ghost, not Casper.”

“No, no, I just had an image of you as Shaggy from Scooby Doo,” she said, trying for a straight face. Then she stopped, looking at the closed door.

“That’s creepy, just really fucking creepy,” Clint muttered. 

“Be careful Clint, and remember that compassion can do what steel can’t,” she said, slightly dreamily.

“I’m going, I’m going,” he said, hands up. “Don’t tell Bobbi what you said?”

She snorted. “I love the fact you think she doesn’t know. Now, go!”

Hawkeye went out the back door, and as soon as it closed, the other one opened.

She’d only seen him in dreams, before. They hadn’t shown all the weight he must have lost, or the other million signs of wear that a brief stint in SHIELD medical and wizarding care couldn’t erase.

“Sirius?” It was him, she knew, the intense grey eyes and she  **did** only come up to his collar, and he was looking at her in a stunned fashion that meant he was doing the same.

“You hid the cane,” he said, rusty voice managing to be very guilt inducing.

“I don’t always need it,” she said, trying not to sound defensive. “I can use a brace most days.” She’d just overdone it, as Bobbi had predicted. There was a cranky ache from the pacing, and she grabbed it with a grimace.

“That terrifying blonde said you shouldn’t be on your feet much,” he said, a slight grin forcing its way on his face.

“I don’t want to argue right now,” she said. They had before, in the dreams, sharp words and crashing up on each other’s sharp edges.

“We have too much to do,” he said, hand almost raised before he jammed it in his pocket.

She hugged him, hearing his- real- heartbeat, not quite sure she ever wanted to let go. “Still use the tincture?”

He nodded, and she settled down so he couldn’t see her face. “Oh, by the way, my father is sort of a dragon.”

“Wait, what?”


End file.
